


The Stars Brought You Back (For A Moment)

by SeijohTrash



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Angst, Elf Iwaizumi, Elf Oikawa, Fantasy AU, M/M, Oikawa dies but don’t worry, POV Iwaizumi Hajime, i don’t know where this came from, iwaoi - Freeform, no beta we die like men, the closure is.... not really there
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-15
Updated: 2021-03-15
Packaged: 2021-03-23 09:48:24
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,411
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/30053610
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SeijohTrash/pseuds/SeijohTrash
Summary: “You are always so gloomy,” a familiar voice spoke from beside him at his open window.Hajime did not look away from the night sky. Legends had often spoken of the power of the stars to return souls, if only for a moment, to those thinking of them.“I am grieving.” He replied evenly after he felt he had adequately composed himself.
Relationships: Iwaizumi Hajime/Oikawa Tooru
Kudos: 13





	The Stars Brought You Back (For A Moment)

**Author's Note:**

> i promise i promise i promise the other fics i’m working on ARE in progress... i just watched the Hobbit and was inspired, okay??? i’m so sorry for this omg

The fact was that the battle took many lives. Hajime didn’t know if he would ever grow used to the feeling of regret, the numb horror of losing so many to a cause that now seemed so infinitesimal.

Battleground strewn with bodies, Hajime combed through the slain closely, eyes both straining for and dreading finding a certain corpse. 

He had not seen him since the start of the battle—the most skilled archer he had ever seen—and the area he had chosen to defend was the one most overrun by the enemy. 

Hajime clutched his sword tighter at his side. He didn’t know what he’d do if he found the archer dead in the snow with the rest of the deceased that would eventually be forgotten.

Somehow this archer did not strike him as one that deserved to be forgotten. Hajime would see his name sung and his tales woven into sagas, never to be forgotten even by the minds of mortal men.

He had not know him intimately, but he had known him long. The Wood-elves and Sea-elves had neighboring kingdoms, after all, and as Hajime was commander in chief of the Wood-elves’ army and he was the Hand to the King of the Sea-elves, they had had regular meetings. Hajime had often wondered that if they were not of different kingdoms and races, that if it was easier, perhaps they—

Well, it was no use wondering if he was dead and yet to be found.

A familiar bow stuck up between two bodies ahead of Hajime, and he hurried towards it, praying and praying that it was not he that lay beside it.

The snow was thick with blood as he waded through it, shins stinging with cold and previously unnoticed wounds. He had taken a larger beating during the battle than he had known.

He stopped just short of the bow, hand shaking as he reached to withdraw it from its sheath of corpses. 

He willed himself be strong, eyes firmly shut before finally looking down.

Ah.

So it was him.

Hajime blinked for many moments, unsure how to feel and how he felt in the first place. 

Oikawa Tooru’s face was pale in death, face splattered with crimson and black blood, from men and goblins, respectively. He had fought bravely, Hajime expected, only not well enough to survive.

No. Death did not suit him at all. Hajime disliked looking down on his body, soul feeling like it was leaving his own.

He had only spoken to him a handful of times before—the first when he had detained Oikawa for trespassing on Wood-elf territory, the second when he had chased after him when he’d escaped, and so on—but he longed to hear his voice. He had put on a pretense of annoyance, if only to stay the quickly growing feelings for some measly amount of time, but now he had not the heart to hide his grief.

His hand raised to rub at his eyes came away wet with tears he had not noticed were falling. He felt as though he were dreaming; or maybe drowning.

The last time he had met Oikawa, the archer had been brimming with life. He had been planning for this very battle, jesting about some warrior or another that he could very well defeat with his eyes closed. Hajime had scoffed at the claim. Now Oikawa was dead.

As a Wood-elf, he would live much longer yet.

Hajime wondered at how to bear that fact.

The funeral was an impersonal affair, piles upon piles of body burned in pyres after a few sacred words spoken by each elven king. Hajime looked at the mounds of ashes afterwards and wondered which were Oikawa’s. 

He was sick at the thought.

It was a long road home. They had ridden here, to the Sea-elves’ home, to help defend their allies against the wicked swords of men and goblins alike. They had won. 

Hajime did not feel victorious. He felt empty. He felt cheated, somehow, like he had no way of gaining closure to something he had always considered in the back of his mind. He had always thought that someday, when they were both older, they might...

Well. 

His chambers were cold and desolate when he returned to them after several fortnights away. He felt lonely for the first time in a long, long time. 

The stars, which usually gave him some kind of solace, tonight gave him only the longing for something warmer, nearer, alive.

In his hand he gripped the arrowhead of the arrow Oikawa had once shot through his doorway into a painting of his mother. 

He smiled as he recalled the profuse apologies that had immediately spilled forth when Oikawa learned of his arrow’s destination. It was one of the few times that Oikawa had ever truly been taken off guard in Hajime’s presence.

“You are always so gloomy,” a familiar voice spoke from beside him at his open window.

Hajime did not look away from the night sky. Legends had often spoken of the power of the stars to return souls, if only for a moment, to those thinking of them.

“I am grieving.” He replied evenly after he felt he had adequately composed himself.

“Grieve those that die in turmoil, not those that die in peace,” Oikawa returned. “You are too superstitious; you can look at me. I won’t disappear.”

He was too weak to refuse. 

If anything, Oikawa’s soul was more beautiful than his physical being. He shimmered like the starlight, his hair sculpted from bronze. His muscles were still present, a testament to his lifetime full of activity.

“I grieve only things that had time to grow and were denied it,” Hajime murmured after a moment.

Oikawa looked like he was equally appreciative of the time to observe him. He did not speak for a long moment.

“I see,” said he, “and do you mourn people who died with but one regret?”

“I mourn them,” he affirmed. “And I mourn my own singular regret.”

Oikawa simply studied him, his large eyes filled with calculating and intelligence. “Pray tell, what is your regret? I think if you tell me yours I may tell you mine.”

He glanced back at the stars, away from the burning gaze of Oikawa. He bade his beating heart be still.

“Do you think you could have loved me?” He asked plainly. His heart wept for a love that had never been given the room to grow roots.

“Yes,” Oikawa answered without hesitation, “and I asked myself the same thing as I laid there dying in the field that day. I wondered what it was all for if I never got to have you anyway.”

It was hard to swallow his tears, but Hajime managed. He was tired of crying. “I wonder what we could have been. We could have been eternity.”

Oikawa hummed, and Hajime was struck with the familiarity of the act. It hurt. “We could have been the stars in the sky. We could have been numberless, eternal, everlasting. We could have been in love.”

“But,” and Hajime hated that he said it, loathed that his directness warranted its utterance, “we are not numberless or eternal or everlasting. We were not in love.”

“Tch,” Oikawa snorted indelicately. “I told you you were gloomy. Don’t you believe in soulmates?”

Hajime’s eyes jumped to him, fixed on his slightly nervous smile and earnest expression. “I think I only believe in one.”

His smile grew. “That’s lucky, then.”

Hajime remembered the tales of soulmates; souls intertwined, forever entangled, destined to meet again in another life or in the afterlife itself or even among the stars. He wondered what those things would be like with Oikawa. He wondered if he could love him.

Oikawa continued. “I only believe in one, too.”

...

Hajime had not been alive long when he met Oikawa Tooru, the boy down the street. They were just little kids, in fact, when first they were introduced.

Still, he always remembered wondering if he had met him somewhere before, that first time he saw him.

Sometimes memories came back in flashes, but he was not superstitious enough to realize them for what they were—memories—so he wrote them off as strange dreams.

It wasn’t as if he and Oikawa had known each other in a previous life. No, he didn’t believe in reincarnation.

But he did believe in soulmates.

**Author's Note:**

> fun fact: i am crying
> 
> also, find me on tumblr!  
> https://www.tumblr.com/blog/view/roobgumball95


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